


Heart Attack Man

by lonelywalker



Category: Heat (1995)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, First Time, Handcuffs, Infidelity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-02
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:41:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25512244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lonelywalker/pseuds/lonelywalker
Summary: After the armored truck heist, Neil goes out to eat. But it isn't Eady he meets there... It's Vincent.
Relationships: Vincent Hanna/Neil McCauley
Comments: 12
Kudos: 32
Collections: Rare Male Slash Exchange 2020





	Heart Attack Man

**Author's Note:**

  * For [beedekka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/beedekka/gifts).



Anonymity was an underrated skill in Neil McCauley’s book. Los Angeles was a city filled with people trying to stand out, to get their big break by any means necessary. Neil had come to appreciate the value of disappearing into a crowd, blending into the scenery, and being so completely unremarkable that no one would ever approach him, let alone remember him. It had worked for him in school, in the military, in prison, and it continued to work just as smoothly in a hectic Santa Monica restaurant.

There were some in his line of work that advocated complete withdrawal, living off the grid, never letting themselves be captured on camera, almost scrubbing themselves from existence. But that was the kind of thing that raised suspicion, that made you “that weird old guy off the county road,” and led the IRS straight to your door. People saw Neil. People lived next door to Neil. People just didn’t care.

“Pass the cream?” he said with a slight wave of his hand, just enough to catch the attention of the guy who'd laid claim to the next stool at the counter

When you saw people at their very worst, stripped down without artifice on the battlefield or behind bars, you learned who they were very quickly. You also learned the surprising number of things that people in the city did without thinking, without looking, half out of ingrained manners, half out of sheer could-not-give-a-fuck. People did what they were expected to do. People passed the cream.

“So what’s good?”

Those words made Neil do something he hardly ever did: he flinched. He’d been napping, absorbed in the potential of his new book, of future plans unfolding before him, relying on the chronic self-absorption of those around him. This wasn't some chummy village gathering, it was a city restaurant buzzing with the hurried noises of everyone at least pretending they had somewhere else to be. The last thing he had expected was some crackpot trying to make conversation.

“Good?” He hoped he sounded dumb rather than guilty. He hoped the way he was now suddenly noticing the man seated next to him at the bar seemed surprised rather than concerned. 

The man grinned while chewing gum: amused, contemplative. After a moment he nodded toward the menu between Neil’s elbows on the counter, laid on top of the book. “Anything you’d recommend?”

Neil tamped down his adrenaline as his gaze strayed briefly back to the menu, his attention remaining fully on the million potential consequences of every answer. “I just got here.”

“Yeah, but you seem like a regular.”

“How do I seem like a regular?” Maybe too much of a challenge, but Neil’s tone kept it just on the right side of convivial… and it gave him an excuse to look over the newcomer in the restaurant's deliberately dim lighting: sharp black suit, black shirt, thick black hair, dark eyes that studied him with a little too much interest. Physically unimposing, but with more confidence and presence than many big men who spent their lives trying to look small. His clothes would have been more at home in a restaurant that added another digit or two to each price. The chunky Bulgari at his wrist would have been more at home on some million-dollar yacht. Neil had three ideas of who he was. Two were very unpleasant.

The response was a shrug, coupled with the little careless gesture of a man who reached instinctively for cigarettes in his inside breast pocket before realizing he quit five years ago. “What, you come here for the peace and quiet, to read your book? Which, by the way, titanium fractures… Real page turner." More gum chewing. “You don’t have a date. This ain’t appearing on no Hippest LA Joints list in _LA Weekly_. You’re here for the food, get in, get et, get out. So what’s good?”

The options of who this man was were narrowing - no underworld thug would care to talk so much - but Neil smiled. “Coffee’s decent.”

That grin widened, gum tucked into his cheek. “Figures. I’m Vincent.”

Neil took the proffered hand, noting the ring on his middle finger. “Not Vince? Vinny? Vincenzo?”

“All of those in my time, but none for very long.”

“Neil,” Neil said. Aliases only got you in trouble.

Vincent mulled it over. “Can’t do much with that. Irish?”

“Much as anyone. You?”

“Eh, New York melting pot.” He was chewing the gum again.

Neil was well accustomed to practiced responses, to the easy shrugs that were a little too easy, to the eyes that watched instead of thought. He filed them away, wondering what wounds were there to prod at: roots in communities that shouldered more than the average hatred, absent father, abusive mother, time in foster homes and juvie… Or a completely average middle class existence that was too boring to even admit.

“So…” The word escaped as he finally tapped cream into his coffee. A word that assumed an ongoing conversation, bridged the silence, and led into something more. He saw himself blocking off his own escape routes. “What brings you to LA, Vincent?”

“Oh, I’m practically a native.”

“I can tell. Not pretty enough to be an import.”

Vincent tutted, putting up mock affront. “Have all my friends been _lying_ to me all this time? Goodness.” He smoothed down his tie with affected fussiness. “You’re not wrong. Have you seen more fabulously beautiful servers in all your life? Order a burger and it’s like attending some life drawing class.”

“You’re an artist?”

That raised an eyebrow. So no, not some flamboyant bohemian, but it was a suggestion that at least seemed inviting. “I do live in some kind of postmodern dead-tech hellscape. Maybe it’s rubbed off on me. But no, I’m what is known as a sworn officer of the law, please feel free to mentally revisit every crime you’ve committed, considered, or watched on TV since 1965.”

Neil laughed. He would have been startled if he wasn’t already so sure. “There was a heist once, but maybe that was on _Columbo_.”

“Ah, the classics. And you… are in metals. Safecracker?”

Neil turned fully toward him, folding his hands on the edge of the counter. “Old metal axiom: when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”

“I have nailed just about everything.” Vincent was suddenly making a show of perusing his own menu, feigning distraction now he had Neil's attention. Neil was almost certain the man needed reading glasses he wasn't wearing. “They tell me there are non-criminal professions. Not sure I believe them.”

“I’m in sales.”

“So I’m right.”

Neil took a moment to survey the bustling restaurant around him, really giving himself thinking space. “You live around here?”

“Ah, a man attracted by postmodern dead-tech hellscapes.” Vincent looked up. In a flicker of better light his hair gained coppery shades of brown, eyes almost green, shirt a deep emerald. “I do not. You?”

Neil held his gaze. “You got somewhere we can go? Or you want to keep pretending you can actually read that menu?”

Vincent smiled, sliding down off the stool onto his feet while plucking at Neil's sleeve. “Come with me, young sir. But do pay the pretty waiter. He's not going to be handsome forever.”

***

The options drummed through his head like so many strategies: take his gun, copy his ID, record his voice, kiss him hard, suck his cock, get out, get out, _get out_.

Vincent had somewhere. Cops always did, some nice little real estate portfolio of hotel rooms where you could stash witnesses away from perps, and drunk colleagues away from vindictive spouses. Nowhere luxurious, nowhere seedy, but blandly anonymous in all the right ways. The kind of place Neil McCauley, salesman, would spend half the year, in identical rooms from Houston through Boston to Nowhere, Nebraska.

His mouth was on Vincent’s the instant the door locked behind them. There were plenty of men like him who could talk and banter and flirt forever, every second of it masking a fear that ran ice cold through their bellies and sometimes tried to turn desire into disgust: how dare you make me want you? Better to know that now than to waste an evening with tentative awkwardness and sudden violence.

“You’ve been drinking,” he said, his hand on the door above and to the left of Vincent’s head, his own breathing faster than he’d anticipated. Vincent had tossed the gum before they got in his car, and the lingering traces of spearmint did little to disguise the burn of bourbon on his breath.

Vincent shrugged with his eyes, unperturbed. “I keep telling highway patrol this is a better way to check for DUIs, but…”

“This what you do, when you’re drinking?”

“Oh, no. I have much healthier outlets.” Vincent's hand moved slowly, slowly down his chest. “Breaking things. Hurting feelings. Throwing myself into my job and not showering for a week.”

Neil smiled. He’d missed this, although it was hard to say when he’d last experienced it anywhere but in the confines of his own head: easy ripostes, the warmth of another body, the very idea of a conversation that wasn’t poised on a knife edge as he ordered and cajoled and damn near begged others to contemplate the very concept of competency. 

Then again, when he worried about Chris fucking up, he worried about Chris getting drunk, getting sloppy, being an emotional wreck who didn’t have his head in the game. He never worried about Chris locking himself in a hotel room with a cop, and a cop who wasn’t some dumb patrol ape at that.

“Your job… You like it?” He’d opted to be non-specific, to feign ignorance, but the words sounded inane in the air.

“I’m good at it. I like being good at things.” Vincent’s gaze held his in a way that implied some challenge, or maybe just lazy innuendo. “Nah, I like solving puzzles.” He ducked under Neil’s arm, tugging off his jacket and observing the minibar with interest. 

Neil's attention was caught by the gun and handcuffs in the small of Vincent's back, vivid against his dark green shirt. Colt Officer’s ACP, ivory grips, echoes of the Corps and a million memories. His hand rested on the door handle. Any number of excuses, from plausible to straight-up fake, and he’d be gone. Vincent would lie here and get drunk and jerk off and never think about him for one second more.

“Puzzles,” he said instead. “You’re a detective?”

“Lieutenant, but don’t get too starstruck. What’s your poison?” Vincent had crouched down by the almost-too-tiny-to-exist minibar and was squinting into its overly bright interior.

“I’m good.”

Vincent made a little noise that might have been half a laugh. “Sure. Don’t feel too bad about passing up the chance for, what, 10cc’s of cheap vodka on the city’s dime.” He looked around and up, eyebrows raised at where Neil was still standing. “Am I scaring you off? Trying to mentally revise your tax returns from 1987?”

“I’m guessing you’re not attached to the IRS.” Neil’s hand slid down off the door handle and into his pocket.

“Robbery-Homicide. No, I cannot help you with your parking tickets, but you got a heist and some dead bodies, please feel free to call.” Vincent had a sing-song way of talking, like he was reciting stock phrases from a vast collection.

Neil eased off his jacket, folding it over the chair where Vincent had laid his, and sat down tentatively on the edge of the bed. The time to go had been five minutes ago. “How does the city feel about its lieutenants being caught with guys in hotel rooms?”

“Caught? What is this, _Candid Camera_?”

“You don’t know who I am. I could be anyone. A reporter. Someone who’ll sell a story to a reporter for fifty bucks.”

For the first time, Vincent looked bored. “I know the reporters. And I know the hungry young kids who’ll fuck and sing about it. Believe me, they’re all a lot better looking than either of us. Wear more makeup too.” He stood up and knocked back that cheap vodka with an air of disgust. “Anyway, don’t tell me you’re some stranger to fucking guys in hotel rooms, Mr. Traveling Salesman.”

“I just really love titanium,” Neil said, deadpan, slipping out of his loafers.

Vincent grinned. “Yeah.” The vodka miniature dropped into the trashcan with a thunk. As Neil watched, Vincent set his gun, handcuffs, badge, and wallet on the counter with such precision it was like he was memorizing their location down to the millimeter. After a second, he added the chronograph to the mix, leaving the silver bracelet that clung to his wrist - family heirloom, personal vanity, or engraved with details of a penicillin allergy?

“So your work…” Probably any actual salesman would be riveted by the prospect of hooking up with a real _Miami Vice_ type. “It’s like it is on TV? I mean, I’ve crossed paths with some lowlifes, and the only puzzle they set is how they’re able to walk and breathe at the same time.”

“There are exceptions. If there weren’t, I’d still be in places with much worse weather.”

Neil lay back on the bed, hands folded behind his head, and felt the tension start to ebb out of his body. He'd been on his feet all day. Now just being horizontal was flipping some mental switch. “Go on, tell me how much of a big shot you are, Lieutenant.”

“I don’t pick up guys in bars to talk about my work.”

“Sure you do.” Neil saw Vincent’s quizzical look. “Look, I’m no detective, but sales is all about reading people, and honestly, what is there even to read? You follow the job across a whole country. You’re wearing a ring, but I guess it isn’t working out, and only half because you like cock. You’ve got murder on your mind 24/7. What a friend of mine would call a heart attack man. No mystery that it’s easier to talk to strangers than your wife.”

Vincent nodded. Smiled. “Never said you were a _good_ salesman, did you?”

“That armored truck thing off Venice Boulevard, that one of yours?” A seductive warmth was pooling in his belly, like a good glass of scotch taking the edge off all his worries.

“You heard about that?” There were chains around Vincent's neck when he pulled his tie loose and opened his collar, thin bands of tangled silver that led downward. 

“Some helicopter news crew grabbed five seconds of footage. You’d think they’d nabbed the Zodiac Killer.” He didn't like to fixate on coverage of his own work, not like perverts who collected newspaper clippings like pinup girls, but knowing what the media knew was helpful in the event he got picked up for some reason.

“Yeah… It’s a mess.” Vincent shook his head, kicking his shoes off with mild irritation. “But I do like messes.”

Neil shrugged against the pillows. He stretched out with his foot to brush the inside of Vincent’s thigh. “Tell me about it.”

There was something alien about all of this: not the kissing, not the burn of alcohol on Vincent’s tongue, not the weight of his body on Neil’s, not the thick hair and the chains around Vincent’s neck that trapped Neil’s fingers. But the unforgiving hotel lighting and the window looking out over the city, out toward a thousand other windows and lights. 

“You were in the military?” Neil asked as Vincent shifted over slightly, tackling the buttons on Neil’s shirt. It was the question that the tattoo on his own shoulder tended to provoke. 

“Marine Corps. Why? Wondering if they taught fucking in boot camp?”

“They did, pretty much.” Neil’s cock was getting full, getting interested. A nice, deep feeling with Vincent pressed to him. “You look kind of shrimpy to be a marine.”

“Fuck you,” Vincent said offhandedly. He dragged Neil’s shirt off, a little more roughly than needed, and sat up, straddling Neil’s hips, working on removing his own shirt. The bracelet was a circlet of those ornate crosses - Maltese? Jerusalem? - Neil figured were only used for jewelry and exorcisms. Trejo would know. Heck, Trejo probably already had the tattoo.

“Always thought the little guys worked twice as hard,” Neil said. “Gotta be smart. Gotta be tenacious.”

“Gotta hit them between the eyes before they see you coming.” Vincent tossed his shirt in a crumpled heap off the edge of the bed. “We only here to compare war stories?”

Neil lifted up an inch, enough to grab a fistful of Vincent’s undershirt and the necklaces beneath and pull him back in. This wasn’t intimacy, the weight of bodies pressed together, smells of sweat and day-old shampoo, the scratch of stubble and the tickle of hair. It was the safety and comfort he'd once found squeezed into niches and sheds and closets and bathroom stalls, where moving meant knocking knees and shoulders into walls, where everything was darkness and silence.

He closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around Vincent, his breathing instinctively shallow, his brain focused on the very possibility of movement outside, as though anyone cared what they were doing. No warden or drill sergeant was going to bust open the door. He was making out with a police lieutenant, a man who could pretty much kill him with impunity, and he’d maybe never been safer.

“You all right?” Vincent asked, low and hoarse, and Neil guessed his breath must have caught like some startled virgin.

“Yeah, just… Lights in my eyes.”

“Right.” Vincent got up, sweeping dark hair up off his forehead, loosening his belt as he found all the light switches. “Sure you don’t want a drink?”

Neil briskly shoved down his pants and underwear, kicking them off in Vincent’s general direction. Even with the lights off, the room was illuminated well enough once their eyes adjusted: well enough for Vincent to see the jutting angle of his cock, at any rate. There should be no doubt about what he wanted. Then he waited, watching Vincent, or the shadow that was Vincent, take off his own clothes, and finally remove the undershirt after hesitation that spoke of too many takeout meals and expired gym memberships. He expected some fumbled excuses, shy attempts at self-deprecating humor… But Vincent simply knelt on the bed between his legs, leaned down, and took him in.

The low moan surprised him when it came from his own lips. He’d had plenty of practice staying silent over more than a guy’s mouth on his cock. But his hips raised as Vincent grasped them tightly, thumbs tracing lines that were almost ticklish, and Vincent’s mouth was so gloriously hot and wet, the pendant on one of his necklaces (what was it? good old Catholic cross?) tapping rhythmically against Neil’s balls…

 _It’s been a while._ The thought entered his head as he wrestled with his own breathing, trying to understand why his body was reacting like this to just some regular blowjob from a middle-aged guy whose own body had seen better days. He had to admit, it really had been a while. These days he had better things to do than fuck around. Jerking off in the shower meant zero risks, zero attachments. But it didn’t make his thighs twitch and his stomach go tense. It didn’t make him alternately close his eyes so tightly he saw stars, and open them because he wanted so badly to see himself in Vincent’s mouth, Vincent’s lips taking him so beautifully.

“The handcuffs,” he said, and it was his turn to be embarrassed by just how affected he sounded.

Vincent lifted his head, coughed and swallowed. “What?”

“I want you to use the handcuffs when you fuck me.”

He couldn’t see Vincent’s eyes well, but he could hear Vincent’s breathing, feel the slide of his hand over Neil’s saliva-slick cock. “It’s not really my thing. Handcuffs, I mean.”

“Sure it is. Just… Just imagine I’m that guy.”

“What guy?” Vincent’s breath was hot on the tip of his cock.

“Whatever guy’s on your mind, keeping you from your wife. The puzzle guy. The heist guy.”

He heard Vincent swallow again. Then Vincent reached around and, for a moment, the handcuffs reflected light that was almost dazzling. “You want out, you tell me,” Vincent said, and he was businesslike in pinning Neil's arms up above his head. “No bullshit safewords, just tell me. I’m not playing around.”

“Wouldn’t you like to hurt him? The guy?”

Vincent let out a breath in what might have been a sigh. “It’s not my job to hurt people. I find them. I stop them from hurting others.”

“But you’d like to fuck him.”

“Maybe in some other life.” Vincent’s hand slid down the crease of Neil's groin, down between his legs, fingers curling around and feeling where the skin puckered. He was working his own cock too, a nicely flushed, full erection that Neil's body was already anticipating.

“A life where you picked him up at the counter of some anonymous deli restaurant.”

Vincent stood up so abruptly that, for an instant, Neil was convinced he’d gone too far. But Vincent just muttered something about complimentary toiletries and disappeared into the bathroom.

“This isn’t ideal,” Vincent started to say apologetically a moment later when he returned, unscrewing the cap of some blandly generic bottle, “but-”

“It’s fine.”

Whatever it was - lotion, conditioner - it didn’t feel half as good as Vincent’s fingers inside him. Maybe it had been a while, but Neil’s body was grateful for the reminder. He’d done this with far less preparation and time on more than one occasion. Eight years of occasions, really, and then another three after that.

Vincent rolled on a condom without asking or being told, which was fair, even if Neil would have liked to think about Vincent’s come leaking out of him afterward. Was that intimacy? Or a longing to be degraded? 

It was a lot all at once when Vincent slid inside him, a rush of sensation and pressure and memory, the handcuffs clanking dully against the wooden strut of the headboard. Neil gave up on controlling his breathing and settled for breathing at all, letting Vincent part his thighs wider. The stretch was a delicious kind of hurt.

“Oh _fuck_ ,” he said sharply when Vincent started fucking him at this new angle, hips rolling at a pace that was leisurely but relentless. The words surprised him, were unlike him, but god if they didn’t send a new ache throbbing through the root of his cock. He swallowed, his mouth already dry. “Fuck me. Harder.”

Vincent leaned in, his belly soft against Neil’s erection. “Shut up.” His kiss was infuriating. It was everything. 

The cuffs, Neil realized in a moment of utter clarity, were a mistake. He wanted with everything he had to pull Vincent to him again, to get a fistful of his hair, of that tight, muscular ass as Vincent pumped into him. But he’d already surrendered. Now was the moment he had to give in to himself.

“Wait,” Vincent said, and pulled away.

The sense of loss, however momentary, was astonishing. He felt empty, cold, alone. And then Vincent’s hand was on his hip, tilting him over a little, lifting his thigh… Neil groaned with relief, tendons straining, as Vincent pushed back inside.

“Good?” Vincent asked. He was lying by Neil’s side now, his voice by Neil’s ear.

Neil managed some wordless sound in reply. This wasn’t what he would’ve considered good in any circumstance, fantasy or reality, before now. It was too close, too tender, too much like they were a couple of Silver Lake pansies making love. But he had a lovely thick cock stretching his hole, dragging over all the places inside of him that were hungry for touch, and now Vincent’s fingertips were on his own stiff cock, stroking with irritating lightness.

“You’d fuck him like this?” Neil asked, wanting the familiar force of anger. “The guy?”

“I told you.” Vincent’s tone was less than steady, a little breathless, but there was no hint of rage. “I don’t want to hurt him. I want to know him, understand him. And then I want to stop him.”

“Do you understand me?”

“I’m getting there.”

Vincent switched grips, and his free hand - the one not holding up Neil’s thigh - slid into Neil's hair, turning his face into the kiss. Neil involuntarily pulled against the handcuffs again. He’d have interesting bruises in the morning. 

“How did you know?” he said instead, getting the words out in the moments Vincent wasn’t licking his way into his mouth. “How did you know I was… like you?” It might not be intelligence on Robbery-Homicide’s investigation, but it was something.

“C’mon.” The note was one of disappointment, either that he was asking this question mid-fuck or that he was asking it at all. “You know how it is. You think you see something. You want to think you know something. But no one’s ever sure until…” He punctuated the thought with a jerk of his hips that made Neil grunt and buck back against him, searching for more. 

“Fuck, deeper.” He expected no response or gratification, but this time Vincent moved, pushing back further on Neil’s knee in a way that hadn’t been comfortable since Neil was old enough to drink. He could feel the hurts that were coming, the aches and strains, but for now his brain was dangerously awash in the kind of pleasure he tried to steer his crew away from - when you felt this good, from drink or drugs or gambling, stupid decisions were never far behind.

A familiar heat was rising inside him, unfamiliar in its slow, languorous build. In the shower, by himself, he’d race through it, knowing exactly how to move to release the tension. But now Vincent was unraveling him in slow motion, every moment an agony of pleasure and suspense, filled with the anxiety that one wrong thrust could let all the pleasure dissipate. Neil could have talked to him, told him, but his mind wasn’t his own, any more than his body was, muscles tense and trembling, breaths becoming whimpers of utter vulnerability.

When Vincent picked up the pace, spurred on by how close Neil was, or driven by his own need, Neil was already beyond relief at the new intensity. He just fucking needed to come, before his oxygen-starved brain blacked out or his body ripped itself apart. And Vincent _finally_ got a hand on him, the rhythm all wrong, but what was rhythm? Neil just needed the barest touch of him as Vincent’s hips jerked hard and Neil came in a spurt over his fisted hand. 

“Oh fuck…” Vincent said, and laughed, hips still pumping through the aftershocks. “Fuck that’s good.”

Neil felt Vincent’s mouth on his again, but his eyes were closed, his head dazed and dizzy as a dozen sensations began to penetrate the thick veil of orgasmic pleasure: handcuffs cutting into his wrists, his thigh cramping and knee stiff, Vincent’s cock still a blunt pressure inside him.

“Hey,” Neil said, coughed, and licked his lips. “I’ll take that drink now.”

“I bet you will.”

The handcuffs came off, and Neil lay there rubbing some life into numb hands, listening to Vincent wash up in the bathroom and take inventory in the minibar. He wasn’t one for domesticity, especially not in hotel rooms bought and paid for by the LAPD, but there was something to the idea of curling up right where he was, amid all those extraneous blankets and sheets that hotels seemed to love, and worrying about consequences in the morning. No one would know. No one would judge him.

“Well, there’s some kind of whiskey I never heard of. Let’s pretend that’s because I’m not classy enough.”

Vincent served it to him in one of those ubiquitous hotel room glasses that could be used for toothbrushes. Neil drank it slowly, savoring the smoky flavor and the burn that came afterward, as well as Vincent sitting there within reach, naked, quiet.

“You’re not a salesman,” Vincent said the moment Neil drained the last drop from his glass. 

“I’ve sold things in my time.”

Vincent took the glass from him, and for a moment Neil saw a flash of him bagging it, sending it to some forensics lab for prints, but he simply set it aside, his own fingerprints smearing away Neil’s. “You can stay here if you want. All paid up. No one will mess with you. Leave the key at reception.”

Neil waited. Any response seemed like a potential pitfall. He was still waiting while Vincent got dressed in the dark, smoothing every unruly lock of hair back into place, replacing his watch, badge, wallet, handcuffs, and gun with the same assured precision. 

“Going home?” Neil said finally.

“Going to see if anything’s changed.” 

The kiss was sudden and unexpectedly deep, lasting long enough that Neil was reaching to slip Vincent’s jacket back off his shoulders and start up Round 2 when Vincent pulled away, leaving the room key clasped in Neil's hands.

“We’ll see each other again, won’t we?” Vincent said. In his charcoal suit, he seemed half a phantom standing there in the darkness, faint light from the window giving shape to the badge on his belt and the ivory grips of his Colt.

Neil shrugged, as nonchalant as a naked man could be. “You can take me out for coffee next time.”

“Maybe I’ll do that.”

There was somehow more tension in the room without Vincent there: an alien, isolated environment, lights continually shifting over the walls, playing with perspective. Neil lay in the faint halo of warmth created by his body against the sheets, and knew he should get up, grab his clothes, and haul ass in thirty seconds flat. Forget the key. He should slip away down some back workers' stairwell and disappear into the shadows of an unfeeling city among another million anonymous souls, far away from Vincent and the scorching heat of his eyes and lips and state-mandated law enforcement powers.

Thirty seconds flat.

Neil didn't move.


End file.
